Stores and other retail environments often display merchandise for sale on shelves and pallets. These conventional arrangements create a number of problems. For example, customers typically remove and purchase products from the most accessible location (e.g., from the front of shelves or pallets). This creates an absence of products on the front of the shelves or pallets, which can be unattractive to consumers due to the disorganized appearance of the shelves or pallets.
Store employees typically replace merchandise at the front of a shelf or pallet by manually sliding or picking up merchandise from the rear of the shelf or pallet, and moving the merchandise to the front of the shelf or pallet. The process of moving merchandise from a rearward position of a shelf or pallet to a more forward position on the shelf or pallet is known as “fronting” the merchandise. This can prove to be a difficult task when other shelving is located directly over the shelves or pallets making access to the merchandise at the rear of the shelves or pallets more difficult.
Injuries often occur when accessing merchandise located at the rear of conventional shelves and pallets. For example, head injuries can occur when individuals accidentally strike themselves against overhead shelves while fronting merchandise. As other examples, serious back and/or leg injuries can occur when bending over or stretching to pick up merchandise from the rear of the shelves or pallets.
As a result of the foregoing problems, employees often neglect to front merchandise. This can have several undesirable consequences. For example, if the front of the shelf or pallet remains unstocked, customers who wish to purchase the merchandise thereon may have to reach to the back of the shelf or pallet in order to reach the merchandise. Many such customers will either forego purchasing such merchandise due to its reduced accessibility or will injure themselves in an attempt to reach and retrieve the merchandise. Also, the failure to restock the front of such shelves or pallets presents an unsightly appearance to consumers and may give consumers the impression that a store is sold out of a particular item or is low in stock on a particular item.
As an alternative to foregoing fronting of merchandise from the rear to the front of the shelf or pallet, store employees may restock the front of the shelf or pallet using newer merchandise, merchandise that has just arrived at the store, or merchandise that is stored elsewhere in the store, rather than using the stock already stored or located at the rear of the display shelf or pallet. While this approach may temporarily solve the problem relating to the lack of readily-available merchandise, it often results in newer stock being sold prior to older stock. This can create stocking problems and, depending on the type of merchandise in question, result in spoiled or expired merchandise that cannot be sold.
Although the problems and limitations described above are with respect to merchandise on shelves or racks, similar problems and limitations exist in non-retail environments, such as warehouses, mail and shipping facilities, and in other locations where items are stored and/or displayed on a pallet, shelf, rack, or other similar structure.